Instinct
by Count of Eight
Summary: Puberty affects us all differently. Killua is not amused. Rated for language.


Killua's hair is very soft.

He knows it is; it's attached to him, but to be honest he never usually gives it much thought. He's always been content to let it do its own thing so long as it stays short enough to keep out of his eyes, which involves the occasional trim and not much else. He doesn't do anything special to it, heck, he doesn't even own a brush. The stuff just seems naturally predisposed to having the texture of down feathers.

Right now he wishes that it would all just vanish.

Gon's fingers are tangled in it; rubbing, exploring, and it's taking levels of self-control that Killua wasn't even aware he **possessed** to keep from pulling the other boy down on top of him and kissing him like a man drowning and desperate for air.

The entire situation, Killua reflects bitterly, is a monument to the inherent injustice of life. He doesn't want him to stop. Really, _really_ doesn't want him to stop, but at the same time he thinks the sensation is about to drive him insane. Gon's fingers move slowly through the silver strands, the touch light and explorative and Killua can't help but imagine what those fingers might feel like elsewhere; exploring his arms, his chest, his...

He stops himself with a vicious bite to the inside of his cheek, griping the sides of the stool for support. No. He is absolutely **not** going to do this now. He often wishes he could stuff his fifteen-year-old hormones into a sack with a few good, heavy stones and sink the fuckers in the ocean for all the improvements they've made in his life.

It used to be enough just to have Gon nearby. Truly, that was all he'd ever needed to feel content. It never mattered to him what sorts of strange places Gon's quests had taken them, or the questionable accommodations they had occasionally had to make do with. As long as Gon was there, he was happy.

Or at least he **had** been.

Now he _wants_ things, and he doesn't have the faintest idea of what to do about it.

Really, he tells himself for the umpteenth time, there's nothing **to** do about it. He's not going to give in to this sob-story of unrequited love and lust and ruin the only good thing he's ever had going for him in his life. He just _isn't_.

But he wants to.

_Who's the real idiot?_ he thinks self-deprecatingly, and then shivers as Gon's fingers graze over a sensitive spot on his scalp. With that he decides that this really has gone far enough and opens his mouth to say so when Gon's thumb unintentionally brushes against his ear.

He surprises them both with a moan.

Killua instantly freezes, muscles locking and fingers starting to put indentations in the soft wood of the stool. Maybe he didn't hear it, he kids himself, but Gon's hands pause hesitantly in their movements and Killua curses himself every way from up.

"That felt- good?"

Gon's voice is so infuriatingly innocent and curious that Killua wants to scream. He isn't given the opportunity, though, because Gon is running his thumb experimentally along the soft shell again, startling another moan from his lips that he belatedly tries to bite back. This is apparently all the confirmation his friend needs, his other hand immediately reaching up to find the opposite appendage.

_This can't be happening,_ Killua thinks desperately as Gon's calloused fingertips begin to tease at the soft cartilage, their roughened pads producing a soft friction that makes his head spin slightly. He wants to tell him to stop, that it's not appropriate, that he doesn't understand what he's doing. Or at least, a tiny voice in his mind is shouting that he should, but it's rapidly being drowned out by the waves of heat that are crawling down from Gon's fingers and diffusing throughout the rest of his body. Another moan tears past his lips and his head falls back against Gon's stomach as the touches become more insistant, more... interested, is the only word for it.

He can't say how long it goes on. Minutes? Longer? But soon his entire body is trembling, utterly overwhelmed by the sensation; the desire for more pulsing inside of him like a second heartbeat. He forces his shaking fingers to close around Gon's wrists and pulls the hands down, away from his skin.

"Stop-" He realizes he's begging, but he doesn't care. If this keeps up he'll...

Gon's mouth replaces his fingers on the sensitive skin, and Killua feels certain that this is how he dies. Here, on a stool in a hotel room, in some tiny, flyspeck of a town, with his best friend at his back, a burgeoning erection in his pants, and the universe refusing outright to make even one iota of sense.

"Gon-" he chokes out, grabbing a rough handful of the other boy's hair, unsure of whether to pull him closer or shove him away. "_What_ are you _doing_?" Mercifully, Gon's mouth pulls back slightly, and the former assasin tries desperately to straighten out the buzzing tangle of his thoughts.

"I just-" The teen seems to be considering. "I just wanted to, I guess."

Killua prays for the floor to open up underneath him. He doesn't know what the hell that's supposed to **mean**, but Gon's breath is ghosting over the moisture remaining on his ear and oh GOD... he is so fucked.

"Hey Killua?" Gon's voice breaks in. "You're uh, you're squeezing my wrist pretty hard."

That wakes him up a little and he releases his hold, staring down at the angry red handprint on the other boy's forearm. Gon doesn't seem concerned by it however, and trails the newly freed hand down his back, tracing slow circles with his fingertips through the thin fabric of the navy tank... and that's it, that is just _IT_. If the world is going to insist on being insane today then fine, great, wonderful.

It can do it without him.

He shoves himself forward off the stool, feeling unsteady on his feet but forcing them to move anyway; stumbling towards some undefined destination. Somewhere, anywhere, it doesn't matter. As long as it's _away_.

"Killua-" Gon's fingers catch at his shirt but he shakes them off with a growl. The bathroom is the first door he sees and he lurches inside, slamming it closed and turning the lock before sliding down the back of its wooden surface to the floor. His hands fist in his hair, pulling until the pain is sufficient to distract him from the ghosting sensations still lingering on his skin. It takes a lot of effort not to kick the sink.

That's when the knocking starts.

"Killua!" Gon shouts, whaling away on the door even though he has to know his friend is just on the other side. The bathroom really isn't that big. "Killua!"

"Go away, Gon," he whispers, knowing the other boy won't hear him. It's all too much. He feels the hot prick of tears at the corners of his eyes and scrubs angrily at them, shoving the childish urge to cry as far down as he can and burying it under irritation. He could deal with the unrequited affection and the sexual frustration; he'd been dealing with those for years, but this? THIS? Gon didn't even know what he was doing, and that makes it so much worse than nothing happening at all. He doesn't want to be just some guinea pig.

He rubs at his face, growling when the hand comes away damp. Deep down, he knows they'll survive this. It's not even a question; not really. The benefit of a best friend is the knowledge that you've already been through harder times, that everything that happens after can't kill you. You've been through the worst together and lived, and they put their worst behind them years ago.

That doesn't mean he's not pissed.

Outside the door Gon's knocks are growing ever more insistant, his shouts getting louder until Killua is certain that if there had been any other guests in this tiny hotel, they would all have been on a first-name basis with him by now. He closes his eyes. If he ignores him long enough, he decides, Gon will shout himself out and then finally give him the time he needs to get his head on straight.

He is very wrong.

It's about half and hour later when all the noise on the other side of the door abruptly dies out and Killua suddenly gets a very Bad Feeling. He can't sense anything; to all appearances his friend has given up, but his gut is telling him that something is about to happen. Something he's not going to like. It's almost as if...

_Oh_, he thinks. _Shit._

He hurls himself into the tub just as the door smashes off its hinges and Gon storms in, face like a thundercloud. "Killua!"

"What the **_hell_**, Gon-"

"That's my line! You can't just ignore somebody for that long! It's rude!"

"I can if I want to- _You broke the door down!_"

"Yeah, because you're being an idiot!"

"I'm the idiot?" Killua splutters. "Me? Listen you-_yaah_!" he yelps as a stream of freezing cold water hits him squarely in the face. Gon had flipped the shower on.

"I think you need to cool off."

Killua spits the mouthful of water he just received into his best friend's idiot face.

Gon, of course, retaliates by shoving him back down into the tub, so he yanks the other boy in with him and then they're wrestling under the spray; biting and pinching and elbowing with the occasional pull on a sopping clump of hair.

"Why are you acting so weird?" Gon growls hotly around a mouthful of his shoulder. "It was nice before!"

"I am _not_ acting weird," Killua snarls back, scrabbling for a better purchase on the slick skin of Gon's arm. "You cant just do things like that to people! Especially not to me!"

"Why not? You **liked** it!"

"That's why you can't do it!"

"THAT DOESN'T MAKE ANY SENSE."

Killua worms an elbow into Gon's stomach. "Well it WOULD if you weren't a complete idiot!"

The breathe whooshes out of Gon's lungs but he manages to jab a thumb into that ticklish spot underneath Killua's ribs. Hard. "Maybe I _am_ an idiot," he gasps. "So you'll just have to tell me why!"

"You're definitely an idiot!" Killua snaps back, pitch leaping upward as Gon twists his thumb into the spot. "And because you just can't!"

"Why not?"

"Because!"

"Because WHY?"

"Shut up!"

"Tell me!"

"Because I love you, you moron!"

And just like that, it's over. His secret, the years of keeping it quiet, keeping it hidden; finished. Gon stills atop him and he's almost too angry to be terrified. Almost.

When he finally dares to look up, Gon's face is scrunched in that way it does when he's trying especially hard to think about something. He wonders what his friend could possibly be doing, but breaking the silence now is utterly beyond him, so instead he struggles to control his pounding heart and waits. Minutes tick by with Killua quietly panicking, doing his best not to fidget nervously beneath his friend's unmoving weight, but then suddenly Gon's face lights up. He beams down at silver-haired teen excitedly.

"This is great! I love you too!"

Killua gapes at him. Gon looks entirely serious. And then something dawns on him. "Did you... Did you just decide that NOW?"

Gon nods enthusiastically and this time he really does scream.

"That's not how it works!"

"But it makes sense!" Gon's face is bright and open, looking for all the world as though he doesn't notice the water still streaming down it. Maybe he doesn't at that, the boy can be so absurdly single-minded at times. "I guess I just never thought about it before. I don't really know a lot about being in love, but when I think about the person I want by my side forever, it's you. Isn't that what love is?"

Killua opens his mouth and then, finding no words, shuts it again. He had intended to say that yes, there **was** more to it than that, but was there? When it all came down to it wasn't that what he had most wanted to hear? This was what he had needed, the rest, well... it could be worked out. So he doesn't speak. Instead he reaches up and grasps the lapel of his best friend's soaking wet jacket, tugging it and the boy wearing it gently downwards. Their breath mixes, their noses brush, and Gon's eyes never leave his; serious, but with a spark of excitement behind them that Killua doesn't miss.

Then their lips meet, and for a moment thought ceases.

It's a chaste kiss; just the softest press of lips against one another, but it lingers with an intimacy belied by the simplicity of the action. When it finally breaks, Gon grins down at him, and Killua's heart suddenly feels too full within his chest.

He waits for the sensation to dissipate, but it doesn't. Instead it builds, filling his chest until it threatens to overwhelm him completely. Before he can even think about what he's doing he's yanked Gon down again, and this time the kiss is nothing like before. It's raw and hungry; full of everything he's never been able to say and Gon kisses him back, all sweetness and warmth and sloppy affection. They press together with youthful abandon; neither of them really knowing what they're doing and neither caring as they clutch madly at one another beneath the spray.

Minutes pass as the kiss goes on, Killua desperately refusing to come up for air and Gon happily along for the ride until finally they break apart, gasping and laughing as they twine together, everything else forgotten.

Somewhere along the line the water is turned off, but the two remain there, unmoving, for a long time after, simply taking one another in. Both wide-eyed and wondering, absorbing every facet of their newfound intimacy with the seriousness and determination of the young. Had anyone witnessed the sight they might have laughed, but for the two boys the world had shrunk down to the sopping confines of their hotel bathtub. Two soaked bodies pressed together outside the flow of time.

When they finally emerge, dripping and shivering, but grinning and blushing and shoving at one another playfully, the air outside seems different; lighter, somehow. Soaked clothing is discarded and replaced, while sopping hair is dried, with a few good-natured jabs and snaps of the towels tossed in for good measure. Killua pulls his head through a mercifully dry hoodie to find Gon beaming at him, and he can't help but return the smile; his mouth stretching into place almost of its own accord.

Everything is different now, and yet... nothing is.

"Dibbs on not telling the manager about the door."

"_Aww..._" Gon whines, but Killua flicks him soundly on the forehead.

"You're the one who broke it, moron."

His friend remains unfazed by this information. "Well okay, I did, but I kinda had to." He shrugged. "You really were being dumb."

Killua opens his mouth to argue, but ends up laughing instead. Softly at first, but it builds until he's clutching his sides and howling as the absurdity of their day hits home. He knows that Gon is looking at him strangely, but it still takes a few minutes to get himself under control; the giddy disbelief inside him temporarily taking on a life of its own.

"We're a pair of idiots, you know?" he gasps when he can breathe again, wiping at his eyes with the back of his hand. Gon shoots him a look that says he doesn't really get it, but won't push because it doesn't seem bad, and Killua stamps down on a new wave of chuckles that threatens to bubble up inside him.

"Idiots together, I suppose," he half-whispers, and this time when he pulls Gon in for a kiss the other boy snakes a finger in his ribs, turning it into an all-out tickle war instead. Not very romantic, Killua thinks, but that's all right. It feels right this way.

It feels like home.

**A/n: So I had kinda intended for this to be serious, but given the premise I suppose I should have known better. I can just totally see Gon getting a puberty-induced urge or two and, despite not understanding them, feeling no qualms about acting them out. He's just so brazen about the things he wants, it makes sense that it would translate here as well. Anyway, it was fun to write and I hope you enjoyed it! Thanks for the read.**


End file.
